


Living for You is Easy Living

by Lucky107



Series: The Wanderer [2]
Category: Fallout 3
Genre: Best Friends, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Bullying, Time Skips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-12
Updated: 2016-11-12
Packaged: 2018-08-30 14:07:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8536129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lucky107/pseuds/Lucky107
Summary: That's the one thing Cassidy's learned for fifteen years of friendship.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Easy Living - Billie Holiday - 1937

When Amata catches up with Cassidy in the diner at lunch hour, she drops her tray onto the table and falls into her seat without a single word.  The silence is unusual for such a chatty girl, but Cassidy continues about her meal without prying; when Amata's ready to talk, she will.

That's the one thing Cassidy's learned for fifteen years of friendship.

Amata can be incredibly fragile - words cut like a hot knife through butter - and sometimes Cassidy just wishes to look up and find Amata sporting a big black eye.  The physical evidence would at least give her something to report to security and a good smack might just be what she needs to toughen up...

But that fragile character is exactly what connected the two of them fifteen years ago and it continues to be the one commonality that they still share, all these years later.

When Amata sticks her fork aggressively into the mush on her plate, she catches Cassidy's attention.  "What's their problem, anyway?  So I'm the Overseer's daughter - so what?  Like I get any kind of special treatment—"

It isn't even the Tunnel Snakes that break Amata's spirit anymore - it's her own father.

Living under Alphonse Almodovar's thumb gnaws away at Amata.  She can't see it, and Alphonse won't see it, but Cassidy sees it as clear as day.  Once there was a blaze in Amata's eyes that would flare up at the mere mention of her father.  She was rebellious and strong, completely independent.

Now there's nothing in her eyes but a hollow, lifeless defeat.

Amata looks Cassidy right in the face before finally confessing, "But at least... at least I've got you."

Cassidy hurriedly looks down at her plate, a warm flush spreading all the way up to her ears, and for the first time this week Amata really smiles.

\- - -

Amata's slender fingers ghost along the nineteen-year-old Cassidy's swollen cheekbone, careful not to touch the raw skin directly.  "You look terrible," she says and it takes everything Cassidy has not to turn her face away defensively.  "I'll clean it up for you, but you won't be able to hide it from my father."

"It's fine," Cassidy insists stubbornly, but it's the farthest thing from 'fine'.

When Amata observes her injuries like this, acknowledging Cassidy's weaknesses and coddling them, she just wants to slap her best friend's hand away.  But she doesn't.

The more frequent the cuts and bruises become, the harder it is to pretend that Cassidy is no longer getting into physical altercations with the local bullies.  Amata has been doing everything she can to keep her father blind to her best friend's delinquent ways, but...

"It's not _fine_ , Cassidy!"  Amata stresses.  "You need to stop standing up for me like this.  My father is the Overseer for God's sake!  Let him take care of guys like Butch DeLoria.  I—if you keep acting like this, I worry that he's going to take care of _you_ , too."

Alphonse has become a cold, ruthless man over the years and he's never liked Cassidy, but the look in Amata's eyes as they stare into the mirror together suggests that she's actually _afraid_ for Cassidy.

When she meets Amata's gaze in the mirror, Cassidy says, "I'm not afraid of your father, Amata."

"Well... maybe you should be."


End file.
